All I Want
by Ham Atom
Summary: North finds a letter Jack wrote a long time ago, only a few short years after becoming Jack Frost. It's a letter of particular interest to North. It's a letter…to Santa. North and Jack father/son bonding and sweetness. Guardians as family. Complete.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: So...Rise of the Guardians is my latest obsession. Obviously. Why write a fic for something you're not obsessed with, am I right? Anyway, this story is mostly complete and will be updated regularly over the next few days as I finish and polish.

This story started with me hearing the song "All I Want" by Steven Curtis Chapman, and I had to make a video (even though I don't make videos). But it's a good skill to try to develop, and I had fun doing it. Tons. It's very amateurish, but it _is_ Rise of the Guardians, and let's face it, it's hard to make Rise of the Guardians look bad. If you'd like to see it and get a good look at what this fic's about, it's on Youtube, and I'll put the link up on my profile. : ) Thanks for reading this Author's Note, and I hope you enjoy the story!

Oh, and I should say, this is based solely on the movie and doesn't take the books into account, canon-wise. But read the books, though. They're great!

* * *

_294 Years Ago_

There was something extremely satisfying about having to _sneak._ Jack loved it. Everywhere else he went, he was free to come and go as he pleased. Nobody bothered him about it. No matter how much he begged them to, nobody bothered him about it. But here, _here_ among the shifting, glacial ice and tower-sized snow drifts of the North Pole, Jack Frost—invisible man extraordinaire—had to slip footprintlessly up to the infamously lone structure jutting out from all the whiteness. He clutched in his hand a folded piece of paper like it was an admission ticket. _With any luck…maybe it will be._

The building was huge, warm and inviting, and he could smell chocolate and peppermint and burning wood. All he wanted in the world right then was to see inside, and it was all more awesome than Jack had thought to imagine.

…Which was probably why he got a bit clumsy.

He technically wasn't doing anything wrong when he jimmied open a heavy window with his staff. There were no signs that said No Trespassing anywhere that he could see. But the monstrous Yeti that appeared out of nowhere and started shouting angry, blustery things _right at him _seemed to think it was implied. Huge and hairy and way too authoritative, and Jack had never seen anything like it.

With a startled yelp, Jack raised his staff one-handed, ready to defend. Jack was five foot eight and built to ride the Wind. This thing was like eight foot five and built to tow a barge. He'd later call that an exaggeration, but either way. He didn't stand a chance. The fact that the heavy window slid down on top of his ankle so he was effectively trapped hanging out of the building with one leg in and one leg out really wasn't helping either.

Fortunately the Yeti seemed more interested in scolding him than dismembering him. That was greatly to his advantage. _He's probably just a big softie, deep down. A teddy bear. Teddy Yeti. No. Yeti bear? Focus, Jack. _"So you work here, huh?" Jack grit his teeth and tried to look smiley and tried harder to free his right foot. "Would you believe I have an appointment?"

"Blargha!"

Jack did not speak Yeti. "Is that disbelief? Or a declaration of friendship? That…seems like disbelief. And scorn." As it turned out, Yetis are very good about freeing people trapped by windows. As it further turned out, Yetis are not very good about being gentle. Jack found himself hurled out, facedown and spitting snow.

He smiled a little. "Well. Not bad for a first try, right?" The Wind lifted him up encouragingly and set him on his feet. The Wind never said anything back. But he talked to it anyway. People never said anything back to him either. He brushed snow out of his hair.

He used his toes to flip his staff up in his hand and twirled it around, and only then did it occur to him that, "Oh no." The paper. It was missing. He must've dropped it. He fell to his knees and threw some snow around in a quick, fruitless search, but he already knew he wouldn't find it.

"Well. That's perfect I guess." That thing was supposed to maybe, possibly, somehow fix things. Because Santa could _see_ him. Jack was sure of that. More sure than he'd ever been now that that hench-Yeti had seen him.

Jack had seen the sleigh before, from a distance. He hadn't been able to shout loud enough or fly fast enough, but someday he would. He'd already spent six Christmases listening to children all over the world talk about this Santa person. Santa Claus. Father Christmas. Pere Noel. Sinterklass. Joulupukki. Ded Moroz. St. Nicholas. He had dozens of names, and whichever one he preferred, he was supposed to be wonderful and generous and give children what they wanted for Christmas.

Jack wasn't exactly a child. In terms of age…he wasn't sure how old he was exactly. He liked to play with the children—snowball fights and ice skating and pulling all the best pranks—and most of the time he laughed alongside and could imagine he was one of them. Some of the time, though, when he would whisper his troubles and his secrets to the Wind or plead with the Moon, he felt very grown up. But he only remembered six years, so maybe that counted for something. Maybe he was still young enough for it to be all right. The children wrote letters. Jack couldn't mail a letter. But he could deliver one. Or he could've. If he hadn't lost it.

"No problem. I'll just write another. A better one. And he'll…he'll hear me. It'll matter." The Wind whistled a bit around his ears, and probably he was only imagining it sounded doubtful. "It will," he pressed. And more quietly, _I will. _He looked up at the lit-up, dome-shaped structure with its smoke rising from its chimneys in defiance of the cold all around it. Jack liked the snow. But sometimes he wished…he didn't say it out loud. Some secrets were too secret even for the Wind. "Anyway, this was only my first try, and I was so close! I made it all the way up to the window. I was halfway inside!"

The Wind seemed suitably impressed.

"I'll try again. And next time…next time will be _huge._ I'll come in fast from above." He gestured grandly his battle plan. "With an enormous snowstorm to cover my approach, and…and, and I'll leave treats out for the Yetis. Remind me to read up on Yeti treats…"

As if on cue, a pack of Yetis came barreling over a drift then, four or five of them, running _much_ faster than he would've thought something that size could manage. With a whoop and a grin, Jack shoved up from the snow and led them on a very entertaining game of follow the leader. He wouldn't have thought Yetis would be such established ice skaters. Probably the Yetis wouldn't have thought so either.

Jack did try again. Lots of times. After that day, though, he never got so close again. His plans grew more elaborate, his methods more sophisticated, the Yetis more exasperated. And it was always fun. But he never got so close again. Eventually he stopped writing the letters. Eventually he forgot he'd ever written one at all.


	2. Chapter 2

Eventually he stopped writing the letters. Eventually he forgot he'd ever written one at all.

* * *

_294 Years After That_

"Jack!" North called loudly with as much impatience as he could cram into the single syllable. Which was quite a lot. He'd been practicing. His footsteps thudded heavily along the stone floor from his office. He'd heard the telltale laughter—the mischievous, spritely affair that came straight from that fun-filled center—the one that meant Jack Frost was doing something he very likely shouldn't. "How many times I have told you…?"

He walked up to the railing, looking out over the multi-floored workshop area and its usual hectic bustle for one out-of-place Guardian. He thought again of the one thing he'd told Jack not to do and with an irritated bluster, he looked up. Around brightly painted flying machines buzzing to and fro and through falling scraps of ribbon and tinsel and wrapping paper, there, sure enough, up in the rafters. The little imp was on his belly dangling his staff over the edge, twirling it around, sending down just enough of a whirlwind to blow pink princess wrapping paper from its bolt to wrap around and ensnare a cranky but largely innocent Phil the Yeti.

"Jack!" Startled, guilty blue eyes flicked toward him and widened marginally at having been caught. "If I tell you one time, I have told you eight hundred _billion_ times! Do not _fly_ through workshop, and do not bother Yetis!"

The guilt quickly changed to an air of innocence as Jack sat up on the beam, his feet swinging over the edge. He brushed dust off his sleeve and called down, "Oh, come on, North. We were just playing around. Right Phil?"

Phil, still encased in princess paper, let out a rather put-upon grunt as an Elf happily stuck a pink glittery ribbon to his head.

Jack's grin grew. "See? It's good for morale." The sweet smile tried its hardest to be contagious, and on another day it might have been. North was aware that on another day, without a looming deadline and anxiety that they were getting behind and wanting things to be perfect, he would've laughed loudly deep down to his belly and made a joke about some little girl being very happy to get a Phil for Christmas.

"You do not _listen_ to me! Now is not the time! Only nine days left until Christmas to get everything…"

"Okay, all right, I hear you," Jack cut him off sounding put out and doing that trick he did with his eyes—the one that was just _almost_ an eye-roll but not quite enough of one to call him out for. "I'm sorry. I'll come down and help." And with that he pushed off his perch. Perhaps if he hadn't been so involved with _almost_ rolling his eyes, he would've been more aware of his flight path.

But North saw. In one horrible moment, North knew. And even in the instant he knew and called out, he knew he was too late. "Wait!"

The Wind Jack summoned had already picked him up, and at North's shout, the boy turned his head. The split second realization filled those eyes with panic. There was nothing he could do. Then Jack's Wind drilled him into a speeding, whirring flying machine. The impact quite literally knocked the Wind out of him. There was a loud crash.

And then Jack was falling.

He flipped over in the air, bouncing off the enormous wooden column that rose from the center of the room, reaching for anything he could to slow himself down like anyone's instincts would tell them to do. If he'd grabbed the wooden staircase that wove around the column, he would've made it. His hand met instead with the black metal pipe attached to that column, and he clutched at it.

"Jack, no!"

There was a sizzling, popping sound. Like when cold water is thrown onto a hot frying pan. And then Jack fell further until he hit the base of the column where the wood fanned out ornamentally, and he went tumbling off of that, dropping a few more feet until he landed with a _swish_ in a heap of the excess wrapping confetti that littered the ground floor waiting to be swept up and recycled.

"Glazunov!" North exploded, eyes darting around. "Bring me platform!" he shouted to the Yetis, to anyone near. One of the great, swinging wood platforms the Yetis used to transport gifts from floor to floor swung his way, and he hopped on, peripherally aware of the worried eyes of Yetis and Elves alike following him in the enormous room he had never heard so quiet. He leapt off the pallet while he was still a good distance from the floor, the piles of paper easing the impact.

Jack was already making his shaky way to his feet, staff still clutched tight in his right hand, knee-deep in confetti. He had little scraps sticking to his shirt and pants and in his hair where old dust and cobwebs still clung from his time crawling up in the rafters. "'m okay. I'm okay. That was…" he was saying dizzily when he winced and looked at the palm of his left hand. What little color he had drained from his face. "Oh," he whispered. Then he swallowed thickly.

North sloshed through the paper up to Jack and took him by the arm, turning the injured hand over so he could see it. He uttered the name of every Russian composer he could think of from Tchaikovsky to Rubinstein in dismay.

The pipe Jack had grabbed was one that transferred heat from the main furnace throughout the building. The skin on Jack's palm had been burned and torn off. There was no blood, only black scorched flesh and the gleam of exposed bone, and a Guardian might be immortal for all intents and purposes, but a Guardian could still _hurt_.

"N-North?" Jack asked shakily, and North looked down to see pale blue eyes wide and glassy and lined with shock staring up at him looking for help. And in that moment the three-hundred-year-old immortal looked frightfully young.

"Come," he commanded quickly, and with hand still around Jack's forearm, holding the injury out away from him, North swept the boy across the room to the closest window. The window was ancient, and it took some effort to pry it open as there was never call to open these windows and let in the cold of the arctic north. But North managed it, shutting his eyes as a freezing gust of wind swept past.

The boy pulled back against North's grip. "Wait! North, please! I'm sorry!" He looked back and forth from North to the window, eyes larger than North had ever seen them and brimming.

"Quiet now. Let me help." The snow outside had drifted up almost to the window frame, and North leaned out and thrust Jack's hand into it, keeping his hand closed over a trembling forearm. A small, painful gasp tore from Jack's throat. And possibly slightly from North's heart. "Is all right. Easy now. It will be over soon enough." Not soon enough. Not nearly. "Snow will help."

The snow did help. North wasn't sure how he even knew it would. As a Guardian, wounds were difficult to inflict and healed quickly, but the snow and bitter cold and ice were such a part of who Jack was that something in North had kicked in and led him to the window. Maybe he just wished for something to numb the pain etched into that face that was normally so full of fun and excitement. He couldn't _stand it._ It was unreal how much North could not stand seeing this boy hurt so much. Jack's mouth stayed pinched tight, quiet and suffering, and North was ashamed at the irritation he'd felt when there had been smiles and laughter. He would've traded every comfort right then to bring back either.

He rubbed the boy's back and kept speaking soothing encouragements in a low voice, and half the time in Russian. Which was all right. Jack knew Russian as well as he knew English.

Gradually Jack's shoulders relaxed; the trembling abated. The sharp creases between his eyebrows and around his mouth went away. His breathing evened out. It took twenty-two minutes at that window, but finally Jack, calmed considerably, pulled his hand free from the snow bank and from North and held it up to inspect. "So," he said, and it almost sounded like his usual ironic tone except for the shaky quietness and the guilt and the gratefulness in it. "_That's_ why you didn't want me flying around in the workshop."

"You are always welcome in workshop," North told him, and he meant it. He tapped his nose, and the lingering sympathy made his tone much more pleading than chastising. "But keep feet on ground and hands away from trouble." He brushed snow off the bottom of his rolled-up sleeves. His tattooed arms were red and needly from the cold, and that could not have mattered less. "I hate to see you hurt."

The boy had the grace to look abashed. "You know," he ventured. "I could've just _made_ the snow to help my hand. You didn't have to…"

"Hush. Now let's see then."

Jack obediently held out his hand for North's inspection. The new skin on his palm was a shade paler than the rest of him, almost blue, but the awful, painful, blackened wound was gone. Soon there would be no indication that it ever had been. "Much better," he approved. "Are you all right?"

Jack ducked his head with a quick, embarrassed grin, bringing his newly-healed hand up to rub at his hair. He looked somewhat confused when small bits of paper fluttered from it. "Yeah. Oh, yeah." He glanced shyly up, and his quiet "Thanks" was as heartfelt as any could be. Then he gave something of a self-deprecating smirk and looked away. "I'm just gonna go…change the 'Days Without Injury' sign back down to zero." He moved off, looking up, and his mouth dropped open in distress. "Oh _no_. The rocket ships!"

North followed his line of sight. He'd been vaguely aware of the crashing sound, but he'd been so focused on Jack he hadn't had a chance to check the damage. The flying machine Jack hit had crashed through the railing on the third level, demolishing a large table full of toy rocket ships. The models were scattered and broken now, and North could see a couple Yetis trying to mend the table and gather the pieces. It was a popular toy. That would set them back. Still, North shrugged his large shoulders. "Is of no consequence."

"No consequence? Christmas is in _nine days_!"

"Eh." He shrugged again, unrepentant. "I have priorities."

Jack blinked at him. Briefly uncertain. Then he shook his head. Like he couldn't believe for a moment that his well-being and health could be higher on North's priority list than whether North might have to work extra hours to prepare for Christmas.

As far as North was concerned, if he hadn't been sure of his priorities before, he'd had them neatly arranged for him now.

Jack was much more determined, his eyes locked on all the damage above them. "Well I'm gonna get up there and fix this," he declared, mostly to himself. "No worries, big guy. Saving Christmas. That's how Guardians do. Here we go." The wind picked up, stirring the confetti at their feet as Jack prepared to fly up there.

"Ahem," North said. Pointedly.

Jack dropped back to his feet. "Oh," he said with a sheepish grin. "Yeah, I think I'll just…" he pointed, "yeah, I'll take the stairs."

North smiled with great exaggeration. "Good idea."

And the boy was off and running, bare feet thunking on the wooden stairs that spiraled up to the higher floors.

Shaking his head in equal parts fondness and exasperation, North shut the window then turned and twisted his back this way and that to work out the kinks that came with leaning out a window for twentyplus minutes. It was then that something caught his eye. It likely should not have. It was a piece of paper. The floor was littered with pieces of paper, many of them in vivid colors and patterns. But this paper seemed different. Yellowed with foxed edges and lacking the sheen of wrapping paper or ribbons. Obviously old, and that didn't make sense. He approached where the paper had fallen and nudged it with his boot, bending at the waist and tilting his head to get a better look.

Scratched onto old, poor-grade rag paper, there was a black, charcoal sketch of a snowflake. Intrigued, North knelt closer. The paper was tri-fold. And written there beneath the snowflake in surprisingly elegant script were the words _November 21, 1718, _and beneath it, _To Santa at the North Pole._

It was odd. It was exceptionally odd. This was what they called the Threshing Floor. A gathering place for remnants of wrappings to be destroyed, reused. Never for letters. Letters were precious and valuable and held the hopes and dreams and hearts of children. Never should one be abandoned this way. It _offended_ him. He reached out for it, determined to meet this child from so long ago, to see his situation and his heart, and, should there be any possible way, to try to make it right.

North picked up the letter. The moment he touched it, his vision dissolved. Flashes of white hair and an impish grin and riding the Wind and watching a family sit down to dinner through a dirty window and snowballs and questioning _why_ and skating much too fast and lonely tears and laughter and fun and sorrow.

North sucked in a startled breath and blinked and stared at the paper in his hand, heart pounding in his chest. _Is not possible._ He looked closer, where the paper had been discolored from the years. There was _To Santa at the North Pole._

And beneath that, simply, undeniably, _impossibly_ was

_From Jack Frost._


	3. Chapter 3

There was _To Santa at the North Pole._

And beneath that, simply, undeniably, _impossibly_ was

_From Jack Frost._

* * *

North walked blindly from the Threshing Floor to the elevator and rode it up, dodging questioning Yetis and stumbling Elves with a distracted, dismissive wave of his hand—the hand not clutching a letter that he would never have guessed could exist. He entered his office and closed the door behind him before walking to his desk and not sitting down.

North's large hands trembled somewhat as he unfolded the rough, aged paper, and he liked to think he didn't know why. He'd never read a Christmas letter from a friend, a fellow Guardian, before. There had never been reason or opportunity to. In a way, it almost felt like an invasion—a look inside what Jack's life had been that hadn't been invited. Jack didn't speak of his past—that era of limbo between being a human and being called as a Guardian—even at North's beckon. He'd shrugged it off, preferred it buried, preferred things to be light and fun and new.

But it _had_ been invited. Only the invitation had somehow been lost in the mail for nearly three centuries.

The script was artful and the words were simple, many of them smudged, and North saw the image of a small, broken piece of charcoal with a stem of ice formed around it to be used as a pen.

_Dear Santa (or whatever name you might prefer),_

North smiled a bit in spite of himself. _So polite and formal, _he mused. Three hundred years or so had apparently robbed his Jack of that sort of attention to the rules of etiquette.

_I don't know if you know who I am or not. If you don't, that's okay. Mostly I don't know also. But I'm writing this letter to tell you what I really want for Christmas this year. Now, I know I'm not a real_

The next part was hard to read, and it wasn't only due to the age of the paper. North squinted to make out the words "child" and "person" and "human" that had been discontentedly crossed out. The term that had been settled upon was _candidate for Christmas presents. _It made North frown before he even realized he was frowning. They were the words of someone utterly, heartbreakingly ignorant of his own value. And North had known, but…perhaps he just hadn't really _known_. The letter went on.

_But in any case I thought it wouldn't be wrong to ask. It's all right if your answer is no. Mostly I've just never written a letter before, and I thought it would be fun, that's all._ Only a part of that was true. North felt that in his belly.

_But getting down to business, I understand that there are certain terms that are supposed to go along with this deal. From what I've heard, it only works if I've been good enough. Well about that…it's good to be honest, right? So I'll start by being honest. Probably (definitely) I haven't been good enough ever in my life. I make a lot of messes and slow things down and laugh at all the wrong times and usually try my best to make cross people look silly. But I didn't know if maybe I could apply for some sort of line of credit with you? If you'd be willing to grant me my wish now, I would be willing to try my very, very hardest to be good—no matter how bored I get—forever. With interest._

_If that's at all appealing to you, all I want in return (and I know it is a lot to ask)_

North closed his eyes abruptly. In his mind's eye, he could see young Jack, balanced precariously on a much-too-high tree branch, bottom lip caught between his teeth as he looked around, almost as if to make sure no one was watching, before scratching in the next three words… _is a family._ The boy looked around again, swiped his sleeve quickly across his eyes and went back to writing, his charcoal moving faster across the page.

There was something hot in North's eyes and constricting in his chest, and it made it more difficult to read. The emotions, every one of them that went into this letter, went into North. And there was bravery and fear and hope and such, such _longing_. And this was somehow Jack. This voice that sounded somehow like him and utterly foreign all at once, was Jack.

_It doesn't have to be a large family of course. Just parents, and/or perhaps a brother or sister. Maybe even just one person. One person who sees me would be enough. Someone who could teach me how to make other people see me. Or if that's not possible for me, just someone who will be there and look at me and talk to me and we could share jokes and maybe they would be able to tell me when I'm about to do something that is a terrible idea. I usually don't know something is a terrible idea until I've already done it, you see. I have poor foresight. The Wind agrees. _

The boy in the tree nodded at his words at that point and thought himself very straightforward and professional.

_But maybe if I had a family, someone who could see me, they would be able to help me with that. And really, they don't have to be perfect. Probably they would like me better if they weren't perfect because we would be alike that way. But anyway, I would love them no matter what, I promise, and I would take care of them always if ever they're hurt or scared or sick or sad. I would. You wouldn't be sorry for giving them to me._

The determination was almost greater than the wistfulness.

_Now, I understand if this is too short notice for you, so even if I have to wait until Christmas next year or the next year or the next year, I could still bear it just if I knew I wouldn't be alone anymore. _

There was a small line of bravado crammed in between this short paragraph and the next, obviously added as a revision. It went, _But also if your answer is no, that's okay too because I get along fine with just me and the Wind, _and had all the markers of a falsehood and all the markers of being young and hurt and already afraid to hope too much. And still there was a greater innocence in this letter than had survived three hundred years of loneliness and being invisible.

From the time North had met Jack only a few fleeting months before, he'd thought of the boy, in some respects, as a child. And that was Jack's nature—full of fun and life and energy, always coming and going, eager to please yet still prone to making mistakes and learning from them. But the Jack who had written this letter longed for protection and comfort and encouragement and someone to depend on. Someone to love. Someone to love him. And after three hundred years of convincing himself that he didn't actually need any of those things, that all of those things were beyond him, how much of that childlike spirit could have survived?

Two hundred and ninety-six years ago, the boy was smiling as he wrote the end of the letter.

_If you can manage it, it would be the grandest Christmas ever, and I would never ask you for anything else. Thank you for reading my letter. Wishing you white Christmases always (and often providing them at no extra charge)._

_Yours,_

_Jack Frost_

And then North saw that boy search out the way to the Pole. He'd found it. Few could. And then North saw the window and the Yeti, and then he saw that letter get trapped underneath a window that they never had reason to open. Until today. Until Jack. Until a gust of wind blew it from its hiding place and onto the Threshing Floor. That was all. The life of a letter.

At last, North sank into his chair, setting the letter gently on his desk as the words and feelings faded. Jack Frost. Age…six. Incredible. He'd come to North for help, and he'd been thrown out in the snow.

Three hundred years of being Jack Frost. Alone. As long as North had lived, there were times when three hundred years felt like an extended weekend. But right then, three hundred years seemed like a long, long time.

The look on Jack's face when North pulled him over to that window suddenly came to mind, and the context was devastating. Amid the pain, there was something so much like terrible, ingrained fear. _Wait! North, please! I'm sorry!_ Did he think he would be thrown out? Again?

North rubbed his face. It was nine days until Christmas. He had a to-do list as long as a Yeti's arm. But frankly all he could think about was that boy in the tree. He _needed_ to talk to Jack Frost.

He pushed up and took the letter, stowing it in a pocket before he went to his door. A quick walk out onto the floor to the rocket ship disaster area, and he found Jack there, dutifully gathering broken pieces of plastic toys under an oak table, talking with Phil the Yeti.

"Okay, _fine,"_ Jack drawled. "If we're going to make a thing about this, I will admit it. I am a _little_ jealous that I will never be able to grow a moustache as full and manly as yours. There. Are you happy?"

Phil answered with supreme, lofty satisfaction.

"Jack," North interrupted, and Jack looked up so fast he knocked his head on the underside of the table.

"Ow," he gave an embarrassed wince and peered up at North, rubbing his head. "How long have you been standing there?" He shot a traitorous look at Phil. "Did you _plan_ this?"

North was momentarily distracted by the large eyes always the shade of a winter sky and the silver-white unruly hair and the quick smirking grin and all the things that looked so very much the _same._ He swallowed quickly and merely nodded the boy out. "Walk with me." He turned and led the way to the elevator.

"I…wha…?" he heard Jack try to ask before the boy gave up. "Okay." And there was a scrambling and then light, following footsteps.

* * *

A/N: Would like to take a quick second to say thank you to all those who reviewed and encouraged! Thanks a bunch! You all are darlings! : )


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Thanks everyone who's been reading! Your sweet reviews make my day! Just thought I'd let you know there's one more chapter after this one. I'm _really_ hoping to get it up by sometime tomorrow. Going for the five chapters in five days thing. As anyone who is reading any of my in-progress stories will tell you, that's a pretty lofty goal for me, lol. I'm not always the most time-conscious updater... But anyway, that's the goal. If not by tomorrow, I'll definitely have this thing labeled "Complete" pretty soon. All right, that's all. On with the story!

* * *

North was momentarily distracted by the large eyes always the shade of a winter sky and the silver-white unruly hair and the quick smirking grin and all the things that looked so very much the _same._ He swallowed quickly and merely nodded the boy out. "Walk with me." He turned and led the way to the elevator.

* * *

Jack wasn't sure what he expected. Maybe that North wanted to have a talk about safety or following the rules. Which he deserved and would've nodded through as attentively as he could manage. Or there was that little flutter in his stomach that thought that maybe he was in bigger trouble than he'd thought and North would tell him to leave the Pole and only come back if there was some kind of Guardian emergency. That thought made him swallow. But he liked to think he was an optimist and maybe the big Russian Guardian only wanted his opinion on the menu selection for Christmas dinner.

He'd already stopped pretending, at least internally, that Christmas dinner wasn't a huge deal to him. It was his first real Christmas of having someplace to go, and he _wanted_ that. North and Tooth and Bunny and Sandy would all be there, and he liked them and thought it would be…special or something. It really wasn't on his list to mess up so bad so close to Christmas, but surely North wouldn't toss him out now. He was a Guardian now, and that couldn't get taken away, right? _Of course not. Everything's fine._ North didn't even seem mad. If anything, North seemed…concerned maybe? And that was odd all by itself but probably could be chalked up to a preoccupation with the whole nine-days-left-til-Christmas thing.

Besides, Jack was pretty thoroughly convinced that North didn't mind having him around. Ever since defeating Pitch, the older Guardian had been a world of help in getting used to all the rules and wherefores of being a Guardian. And not only that, there were at least a dozen cases when North would go out of his way to help Jack out, just for no reason at all. Even with things Jack hadn't thought he needed help with. Like a place to sleep. Jack didn't require a whole lot, but every few days, he did need to recharge just like anyone else. Every once in awhile, if he thought about it, he'd build a really cool snow fort or tunnel to sleep in. He hadn't done that much since the Snowplow Incident of '09. More often he'd just wait until he got exhausted and then collapse in a snowbank somewhere or among the rocks surrounding his lake in Burgess. And it had never ever been a problem.

But apparently North was keeping an eye on him or something because now when he did that, he'd somehow wake up back at the Pole, snug in a bed. And these beds had to have some kind of enchantment or something because they were just stupid comfortable. Jack had realized too late that it should really chafe at all his independent instincts to have North—what? Checking up on him?—because by then he'd already been ridiculously touched and grateful. At least the first time. And...every time since. But he'd quickly made up his mind that it was okay because if anyone teased him about it, he could always say that North was huge and kept his swords very sharp and _had magic_, so it made sense just to go along with the guy. So far no one had teased him, though.

And if he needed any more proof...there was the thing with his hand just a little bit ago. North wouldn't have...been so nice like that if he didn't like Jack at least a little.

In any case, whatever Jack had expected, it wasn't _this_. It was a part of the Pole he'd never been in, and he'd thought he'd been everywhere. They'd been traveling along narrow but well-lit, windowless hallways, and, as far as he could tell, they were underground somewhere. The room was round and not terribly large. There was a big, overstuffed easy chair in the middle, sitting on a thick, woven cord rug. But that wasn't the part that dropped his jaw and left him standing and gazing and unexpectedly amazed. He managed one inarticulately whispered "Whoa…"

North's hand on his shoulder pulled him further into the room. It was incredible. The whole room was bathed in streams of bright, sparkling lights in every color of the rainbow. Familiar, and yet...he could hardly believe it. The lights moved—swirled and bent and floated and bobbed. He somehow managed to tear his eyes away to look at North. "What…?" he asked, and it was all he could do.

The smile North wore was wide and bright, and his eyes reflected all the wonder Jack felt, wonder that chased away some of the shadows that seemed to have been lurking behind North's eyes since down in the workshop. "These," he said grandly, and he swept out his hand, "are the letters."

Jack blinked rapidly several times, trying to get his mouth to form words. "Letters?"

"Christmas letters. From children." Jack must have been gaping a little too much because the man gave a great, loud laugh and patted him on the back. "Is not what you expected?"

"Wh…ah…no. North, these aren't letters. These are lights."

"Lights on Globe are lights," he pointed out reasonably. "But they _represent _children." He reached out and put his hand in a stream of light where it glowed yellow. Then there was a sparkling, almost like dreamsand, and a piece of paper materialized. Just regular copy paper, and on it, a letter written in purple crayon. _Dear Santa,_ in large, clumsy letters with a backwards _S_. It was a letter asking for a stuffed zebra with a string attached so she could take it for walks. Signed _Love, Lili._

"I thought," Jack said, still staring. "I thought kids _mailed _their letters to Santa."

North laughed again. "Who would deliver mail up here?" he asked logically. Then he whispered behind his hand, lightly teasing, "We don't get _pizza_ delivery either."

Jack found himself smiling as he looked around the room. He reached for the floating letter. The second he touched the paper, there was a spark of _something_, and Jack jerked his hand back. "I…" he panted, glancing at North. "What was…? I saw…"

North leaned in closer. "What did you see?"

Long, dark hair in pigtail braids and brown eyes and a lime green backpack and standing on tiptoes to reach the pack of Fudge Shoppe cookies on the counter. Jack blinked at the letter. _Love, Lili_. "I saw _her_." And he could hardly believe it. Gradually he smiled and, after an encouraging nod from North, he reached out again.

_Dear Santa,_

She held her crayon tightly, and her tongue was stuck out as she worked to get the letters right. She was six years old, and she could do it by herself this year. Her mother was smiling by the counter and getting things ready for Halloween. Mama said she didn't have to write Santa so early, but she wanted to make double sure he got her letter.

_Plese I want…_ And Jack could see it as he read. He could _feel_ it. He knew her parents and her brother and her home and her favorite cartoon. And this little girl was a rascal and a handful and had a mind all her own and loved to boss people around, especially her older brother, and sometimes she had to stick up for her friend Gordon because the other kids made fun of him so meanly, but she wasn't scared of them. Gordon wanted a lion on a string, and the two fully intended to take their animals for walks together and teach them to get along. She did a lot of things wrong, but some things she was learning to get right, and she was so, so _bright_. And she wanted a stuffed zebra on a string.

_Love, Lili_

"Whoa!" Jack breathed as he let go. "That was incredible!" He put a hand to his head and stumbled a bit and had to catch himself with his staff. He leaned over and caught his breath, still grinning wide. "Wow. And _exhausting."_

"That's why big chair," North laughed.

"But man…this kid is awesome! She's getting her zebra, right?"

North was smiling at him. "On a string," he nodded. "See?" And then Jack could. He saw a box, wrapped in lime green. And inside, a large, plush zebra with a stitched-on grin and a red leash.

A small, bewildered laugh escaped. "Cool."

"Indeed," North agreed.

"So this," he looked around the room. "This is where the letters go." He looked up at the conductive metal ceiling and finally figured out where they were. "We're under the Globe. This feeds up to the _Globe._" He shook his head in astonishment at the sheer..._coolness._ "So these...these letters become…"

"The Northern Lights," North nodded. "Aurora Borealis you see in sky is letters from Christmases long past. These you see now are from this year. They are beautiful, no? Long, long ago, Sandy and Man in Moon helped me make this room. I get copy, you see. The feelings and hopes that are written into letters. That is what I get here. I see into the children's lives, where they are, who they are. That is how I know what to get children for Christmas. Not always what they ask for. But sometimes what they need."

"What do you mean?"

"Makes sense to know circumstances, da? Lot of boys and girls ask for smart phones this year." He made an indulgent face like he couldn't understand that but went on, "But what if parents can't afford data plan? Hm? Lot of things to consider. Sometimes what they ask for is not what is good for them."

Jack had never thought of that. "I guess that's a good point."

"Also, this way when I get request for chemistry set from little boy who accidentally blew up parents' garage, I say instead, 'Here for little scientist is lovely Christmas _microscope_. Have fun discovering things that are…non-combustible.'" He smiled covertly. "And then also I say 'You're welcome' to parents and neighbors and any family pets." He let out a short bark of laughter, and Jack smiled because it wasn't possible not to when North laughed that way.

Jack amused himself with flicking the colored lights with his fingers and watching them coagulate into letters and hand-drawn pictures, and he asked offhand, "You wouldn't just put a kid like that on the Naughty List?" Seemed like Jack blew things up accidentally all the time, and he knew he'd more than earned his place there.

"Naughty List?" North looked at him oddly. "Jack…I keep lot of lists. None of them say 'Naughty.' Or 'Nice' for that matter."

That made Jack look up, expecting to see a joking kind of smirk on the older Guardian's face. North looked dead serious. "What? But you said…"

"'Naughty List' was invented by parents," he waved the notion aside. "Probably to convince children to be more…" he paused to find the word, "manageable around Christmastime. But if child only does nice things to get good gifts, what is point?"

"So you're saying there's _not_ a Naughty List?"

"No Naughty List," North confirmed.

Three hundred years of "holding the record," knowing he wasn't good enough to make it on the old man's nice side, and the whole thing was just a myth? _Are you kidding me? _ "But I thought I held the record!" he exploded. "You said. I thought that was why…"

"Jack." North's face suddenly looked older. Jack noticed that's how he always looked when he was sad. When he was happy and jolly and full of excitement, he was ageless. But sadness made him old. Maybe sadness made everybody old. "When I said that, it was joke." He shrugged apologetically. "I thought you knew."

"Then what's with the _tattoos_?"

North looked down at his inked forearms. "Is _reminder_. Naughty. Nice. Left arm. Right arm. Everyone does bad things. Even me. Sometimes I am too short with Elves or too brusque with Yetis." Jack wanted to put in something about being "short" with Elves, but North wouldn't be distracted. "Sometimes I get too busy or short-sighted. Sometimes…" he sighed. "Sometimes I overlook someone who has needed my help."

Jack frowned and kept staring as North reached into a pocket and pulled out a letter. It looked old. He held it out.

Not understanding, Jack reached out and took it. And remembered.

Fear and uncertainty and loneliness and ignorance and desperate hope. And when he opened his eyes, breathing hard and a little like his soul had just been ripped to the surface and exposed, North was looking at him. Not just with sadness. But with guilt. Maybe sorrow.

_Oh,_ he thought and watched numbly as the letter fell from his fingers and fluttered to the floor. He had the sudden, ridiculous, overwhelming urge to cry. _No. _He felt his cheeks flush, and every instinct he possessed had him turning and going for the door. _Get out; get out; get out…_ "Well, I…I gotta go..."

North caught him by the back of his hoodie. "Jack."

Jack tried to pull free, but there was no fighting North's grip. "It's nothing, North. I forgot I ever even wrote that. It's not a big deal..."

"No? To me it seems like fairly big deal."

He forced a careless smile and clung to it. "Agree to disagree, right?"

"I _felt_ what you felt when you wrote it, Jack," he reminded, his hold moving from Jack's hoodie to his arm. "I know better."

"That's fine. It's done. We don't need to talk about it. Last I checked, I'm the Guardian of Fun. Not the Guardian of…" he made a face, "_Feelings_."

North would not abandon that serious look. Or the penetrating gaze. "I did not receive your letter, Jack. It was lost; I never read it. Not until today. I _need _you to understand…"

"I'm not mad. I just don't want to talk about it. Okay? I understand. Everything's fine." That whole chapter was over. He didn't want to think about that. He didn't want to think about any of that. He was just getting used to what it was like to be seen by Jamie and the other kids and be able to drop in to annoy Bunny or share silent jokes with Sandy or be around Tooth or North without wondering why neither of them had any concept of personal space. He did not want to revisit three hundred years of wondering why in the world he existed, and he certainly did not want to be pitied.

But North, as seemed to be North's way, had no intention of letting it go. "I didn't know it was so bad for you, Jack. If I had known…"

"Look, I get it. I'm fine. We're fine. Really, North, don't mention it. Like literally don't mention it. To anyone. You don't have to feel bad for me, okay? I know it wasn't your fault…"

"But do you know it wasn't _yours_?"

Jack stopped and bit his lip. No. No, he wasn't going to let North do this to him. He worked his jaw, willing tears to stay where they were. "I just thought…" He bit the rest of his sentence off when it seemed his voice would get too wobbly. He was embarrassed and ashamed, and he didn't want to deal with any of it. He didn't want to, and North could not make him. He glanced up to find North looking at him, eyes full of reassurance and a simple invitation. Jack was stubborn. But he had very few defenses against that look. He cleared his throat. "I just thought you knew everything," he whispered.

North nodded, full of regret. "I know many things," he said quietly. "One of which is that I cannot know everything."

"I just thought…I wasn't good enough. And that's why…" No one wanted him. No one saw him. It was punishment because North _knew._ But...North hadn't known.

"You are responsible for your actions, Jack. Your decisions and their consequences. Always. But you are not all the time responsible for your _circumstances._ And besides that, Christmas is not time for giving what is owed. That is _transaction_. Christmas is time for giving what is undeserved. I don't give children gifts because children act good and somehow I must owe them. I give children gifts because children are _valuable_. I give children gifts because I love children! Because I love them, I _want_ to give presents."

"I'm not a child. And I wasn't then either. Not really."

"But you _are_ valuable. You are _priceless_. And you were then as well. And if I had known you were outside, I would have invited you in. Oh…" His mouth got tight, and his eyes impossibly sadder. "Would that I had known."

Jack closed his eyes, turned his head away. All he'd wanted was a family. Six years in, he'd tried to write up a business contract for one. And that hadn't worked. Nothing had ever worked. "Some years I tried really hard to earn it. Some years I didn't try at all." And there were the times he'd felt so worthless and undeserving and like maybe he'd somehow been marked somewhere everyone else could see that he was unfit to be loved.

"Jack, a gift is not something earned by good deeds or forfeited by bad. A gift could no more be earned than goodness measured by an expectation of returns. A _gift_ need only be accepted." A large hand on his shoulder turned Jack around. A knuckle bumped his chin, and he was looking up into kind, honest eyes that had always, always told him the truth. "Sometimes you are naughty. Sometimes you are nice. Sometimes you make mistakes. Sometimes you are right on money. _All_ the time you are _most precious treasure_," he whispered those last words with such fervor, as if willing Jack to believe it. "I am sorry you spent so many years thinking you were not worthwhile." He smiled sadly, and his eyes shined. "You are worth all the whiles. And I am sorry I could not give you family on that Christmas. I am afraid I never will get chance. For on _this_ Christmas…already you have one."

North reached down and picked up the fallen letter. There was a glittering, sparkling light that wrapped around it. And then Jack could see. Sandy ganging up on Bunny with him in an impromptu game of egg hockey in the Warren, shamelessly helping him cheat. Tooth taking time out of her crazy schedule to talk to him for hours about his life before and being a Guardian and a thousand other things that weren't important at all. Bunny taking a trip to Burgess with him to start a snow war with the kids on an unseasonably cold afternoon even though he hated the cold, complaining all the way but laughing louder than anyone when Jack nailed him with a snowball to the face. And North. A hundred subtle proofs—proud glances and affectionate touches and helpless laughter. North. Who had at some point when Jack wasn't looking, somehow, unobtrusively become synonymous with the word _safety_.

Jack swallowed as the tears welling in his eyes threatened to fall. He thought he should say something, and he moved his mouth, and nothing happened. There were too many things. Too many things, and too many places inside his frozen heart he'd thought would never ever ever thaw, and that would just be who he was forever until he lost himself to bitterness like Old Man Winter. But here he was. Melting. Like a little kid. Handed the thing he'd longed for since he'd risen out of a frozen lake lifetimes ago. Just handed it like it was something simple and inevitable and not _everything_ he'd ever wanted. What could he possibly say to that? He looked up, and his chest shook, and still there weren't any words.

And then heavy hands on his shoulders, drawing him in. Requiring nothing. Warmth and care and the familiar scents of Wind and snow mixed with the less familiar like sword oil and sawdust.

North embraced him. Held Jack's head to his chest. Hugged him. Like the way he'd seen fathers hug their sons. Like he belonged. And the tears he'd held back since he'd given up writing his last letter finally fell.

Maybe North didn't know everything. But maybe North knew he meant _Thank you._


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: So this was supposed to be done by Wednesday. Honestly, I don't know why I keep trying to give myself deadlines. Because then all I do is trip over them.

* * *

North looked with thoughtful approval over the railing down to the scene below. Jack was sitting atop Bunny's shoulders, stacking what looked to be the final repaired rocket ship. Sandy, sitting cross-legged with a pair of sand-formed goggles pushed up on his brow, set down a sand hammer and screwdriver. Then he yawned and sent a plate of impeccably decorated cookies floating lazily toward the pair. It was intercepted by Tooth who, no doubt with cautions about sugar and cavities, flew it neatly and efficiently over to them. Bunny took one, talking with his mouth full, the words getting lost across the expansive workshop. Jack grabbed two, putting one in his mouth and handing the other up to the delighted Elf who was, for no reason North could fathom, sitting contentedly on top of Jack's head.

They all looked so natural. Comfortable. Jack leaned forward, resting his pointy elbows on Bunny's skull, having some sort of charm-and-giggles conversation with Tooth that went quite literally over Bunny's head while the Pooka made long-suffering faces at Sandy.

He watched the way Jack smiled so easily.

It was good, North thought. It was good for all of them to be together on this day. He thought back to a time, just a few short hours ago, when all his world consisted of offering what comfort and assurance he could to a three-hundred-year-old boy who'd had precious little comfort or assurance.

In the room with the letters, a sharp rap at the door had startled North just before it opened. And there, suddenly, were Bunny, Tooth, and Sandy. Jack immediately sprang back from North, furtively scrubbing his face and trying with all his brazen, youthful might to look as though all were well and normal.

Sandy floated in, a question mark etched in sand above his head, his expression echoing the question, and Baby Tooth flitted around Jack's head, smiling and cooing and expressing general joy at seeing him.

"Ey," Bunny said, pointing. "There you are. We been looking all over for you two."

"The Yetis told us you'd come down here," Tooth explained in her quick, smiling, edge-of-nervous-laughter way. "We couldn't imagine why…" she trailed off as she took in Jack's appearance. "What _are_ you doing down here?"

"Not having some sort of moment," Jack blurted. He gave a short, nervous laugh and sent a rather vulnerable look toward North begging that he not make any kind of scene about it.

North had only winked. "I was showing Jack letters," he shrugged. "He hadn't seen them." And over their looks of confusion and concern at whatever was making Jack so red-eyed and nervous, it occurred to North that he was confused himself. "What you all are doing here?"

Sandy sent up a poof of sand that quickly formed into a representation of the Northern Lights.

Bunny pointed with his thumb. "What he said." He'd already had boomerang in hand when he'd walked in the door. Typical Bunny. "So what's the emergency?"

"Um…" North looked down toward the voice to see Jack raising his hand. "I might have called them. Earlier. You know with the, ah…" the winter sprite mimed the lever one had to twist in and push down to activate the Lights that would summon the Guardians. It surprised North. Though, to be fair, he'd never told Jack not to.

"So there's no emergency?" Tooth asked. "Whew! Aha. Well, that's a relief. I thought for sure…"

"Well. There's kind of an emergency," Jack had said, much to North's puzzlement.

"There is?" he'd asked. "What is it?

"You know…" And for a moment, North thought Jack would tell them about the letter. But then he said, much more nonchalantly, "The rocket ships." He looked at the others with a slight wince. "I kind of broke…Christmas a little bit. And now everything's getting behind."

North had honestly forgotten all about all of that.

"I thought maybe, if you guys had the time… Can you stay?" And of course, because he was Jack, he'd had to add something to sweeten the pot. "There'll be cookies," he'd wheedled. "And milk," he added quickly, ever mindful of Tooth's sensibilities. "You know. With calcium in it. Just…tons and tons of calcium."

North could think of one time in the past dozen centuries that he'd asked the other Guardians to come in to help him prepare for Christmas. And that had been dire—an absolute necessity. A few broken toy ships was hardly a catastrophe. It was a minor setback if ever there was one. But Jack didn't know that. He'd called in their friends to help because in his experience, that's what the Guardians did. They helped each other.

Bunny and Tooth and Sandy were all looking from Jack to North, and they seemed to gather that there was more going on than some broken Christmas presents. They knew North would never ask for help with Christmas unless he was all out of options. North hadn't realized it had become such a point of pride to him, and he felt foolish and petty for that. This was no time for pride. After all, they were family, weren't they? Families helped each other out. How hypocritical it would be for him to try to teach Jack that lesson and then in the next breath to contradict it. North gave a quiet smile and a nod. Clearly he wasn't beyond needing a few lessons of his own. "A few extra hands wouldn't hurt."

His three old friends could have made a fuss about the novelty of his asking for help. They didn't. Of course they didn't. Only they smiled at him like it was nothing strange at all.

"So." Bunny looked smugly at Jack. "You were flying around the workshop, weren't you, mate."

"…Maybe."

"Ha_ha_! Knew it." And Jack visibly braced himself for teasing or a verbal dressing down_._ What he got was, "All right, I'm in, but don't let me hear you bellyaching about pitching in this Easter. I've got some new designs this year. Very painstaking, intricate work."

Surprised, Jack had grinned brightly and formed a perfect snowflake, sending it floating Bunny's way. "More intricate than a snowflake?"

Bunny waved it away with his boomerang. "If you paint snowflakes on my eggs, Frosty, so help me…"

"I'll help, too," Tooth said, already moving and thinking a hundred miles a minute. "I have to fly back to the palace and square some things with my fairies—coordinate the routes—oh, I can do some of that from here if I can appoint some messengers…" She looked up at Jack and blushed only slightly. "I can spare a little time." In total agreement, her little Baby Tooth flew in close and snuggled into Jack's hood.

Sandy stepped up, too, with his warm, golden smile and indicated that he'd be in and out, but he'd love to help as much as he could.

Then Bunny bumped Jack with his shoulder. "Yeah, so come on. Show us your demolition job, Deep Freeze."

North chuckled to himself at the memory. These were special people. He loved to see how they cared for one another, and, especially at that moment, he loved to see how they'd surrounded their newest addition, how they gave him unquestioningly the love and attention he needed.

Across the workshop, Jack spurred Bunny with his heels and pointed ahead, and the word "_Mush!_" was unmistakable. With an indignant protest, Bunny dumped the Guardian of Fun off his shoulders with enough force that Sandy had to rescue the jingling Elf that fell from his head. Jack stared up from the floor, grinning and saying something quick and ironic that made Bunny huff and pull the boy's hood up and over his face. Without hesitating, Jack swept the hood back, revealing laughing eyes and a beaming smile he was failing to hide behind his hand.

_He leaves hood down often now,_ North mused. When he'd first met Jack, he'd noticed that hood. It seemed to North that when Jack was happy and content and spirited and hopeful, he had that hood swept back away from his face. He only pulled it up over his head when there was something to hide from. Fears or sorrow, uncertainty or pain. It had been quite a stretch since he'd seen the boy need to hide that way, and he nodded his satisfaction.

Somehow right at that moment, Jack looked up and saw him. So often Jack's smiles were full of brash, mischievous, teenage bravado. More rarely there was something quieter, something aged and hard-earned that had its edges dipped in wisdom. Right then there was something completely different. Right then there was bare, innocent affection. Like until that point, North had been looking at him in a dark room without even realizing it, and all of the sudden somebody turned on the lights.

A forgotten letter. An overdue conversation. A solemn, unspoken promise. It could never be anything less than miraculous how much they could change things. On the surface, everything was perhaps what it had been. But underneath, it was night and day. There was brand new trust. Never-before-seen confidence. Like a little boy laughing fearlessly as he was thrown into the air because he _knew_ his papa would catch him.

As a Guardian, North had taken an oath to protect the children of the world. There were no words to recite for _this._ Only the silent resolve to be there as often as he could to prove that little boy right.

Across the room, Jack pointed at the finished toys and threw a sloppy, irreverent salute.

With a little exaggerated wave and a nod, North smiled back.

*RISEOFTHEGUARDIANS*RISEOFTHEGUARDIANS*RISEOFTHEGUARDIANS*RISEOFTHEGUARDIANS*RISEOFTHEGUARDIANS*RISEOFTHEGUARDIANS*

Christmas dinner had been everything Jack had wanted. Delicious, colorful foods he'd never heard of and ridiculous desserts and big, bright candles and polished silverware. And, much more importantly, there was Bunny giving some huge diatribe on why eggs were the most perfect and functional naturally-occurring things on the planet—which apparently was something of a tradition. And there was North explaining to Tooth for the thousandth time that just because it was _peppermint _toothpaste , that did _not_ make it a suitable stocking stuffer. And there was Sandy putting on a shadow puppet show of their defeat of Pitch to the tune of Beethoven's 5th which was frankly breathtaking.

There was laughter and bantering and an only-barely-forestalled food fight that Jack would swear blind he had _nothing_ to do with. And then midway through the meal, as Jack was munching on some rice pudding, he bit down on something hard. "Ow." He stopped and spit out a raw, whole almond.

It wasn't odd enough to give a second thought to; probably had just landed in the pudding in all the craziness that went on while the Yetis were cooking the meal. Jack went to lay it aside on his plate, but North was already exclaiming something loudly and distinctly Russian, and it took Jack a second to realize it was about him.

"You've found almond!" North clapped.

Jack glanced down at the plain little nut and then looked around and noticed all the smiles. Clearly he was missing something. "Was it…lost?"

"It's a Christmas tradition!" Tooth said, ever excited. "We picked it up in Denmark. Whoever finds the almond in the rice pudding gets the almond gift!" She clapped her hands together twice and gave a short, high-pitched, "Yay!"

Sandy smiled and gave two thumbs up as an almond-topped trophy formed over his head surrounded by little, dreamsand fireworks.

Jack flat blinked. "What's an almond gift?"

"A gift that goes to whoever finds the almond," Bunny explained entirely unhelpfully. "Keep up."

Jack sighed his exasperation quietly. Whatever this was, he'd just have to go along with it. And if he was a tiny bit super excited, well, there was no need to broadcast that fact. "Okaaay…so when do I get this almond gift?"

North hit the table with both hands. "Right now!" And right there in the middle of the meal, these giants of legend scooted back their chairs and pulled Jack from the table with all the enthusiasm of children at the season's first snow. At some point, Sandy's arm clamped over Jack's eyes, and he was hustled forward amid heavy footsteps and half-smothered excited laughter and everyone shushing everyone else.

All at once, the air grew colder and felt familiar.

"Okay, Sandy," North called. "Let him see."

Jack opened his eyes. And didn't understand. They weren't at the Pole anymore. They were standing at the edge of his lake in Burgess. He turned around to see his friends all looking at him with matching smiles. "What just...? I don't… How…?"

North looked fit to burst. "We make road for you!" He stepped aside, and there behind him, there was a black boulder that looked like all the rest that surrounded his lake. Except that on this one, there was etched a single snowflake.

Jack still didn't understand. "What?"

"Touch it."

He walked forward and tentatively ran his index finger over the symbol. There was a flash of white and then he was in a round, stone room with five circular portals. He looked around. There was his lake in Burgess. And the next one was Sandy's Island. Then Tooth's Palace. Then Bunny's Warren. And then there was the Pole.

"…What?"

"Is road," North explained again, and Jack jumped and turned to find the large man just behind him. "It connects all of us. So always you have easy access if you need any one of us."

Tooth flew forward. "Surprise!"

A road. Jack looked around, amazed, trying to let it sink in. "I...I don't..."

"It's more of a hallway, really," Tooth told him. "It's pretty simple. You see, it's our way of saying…" her smile softened and there was always such beauty in her sincerity, "our home is your home. You don't have to knock before you come in anymore."

Sandy nodded vigorously, and over his head appeared the silhouettes of each of them, hands joined.

"Yeah," Bunny shrugged and bumped Jack's shoulder. "Welcome to the family, Icebox."

Jack was overwhelmed. He managed a smile around infuriatingly watery eyes. They made him a road. All of them. An easily-traveled path that would lead him to where they were. So he didn't have to fly all the miles. They made him a road. And more than that, they made a way to let him know that they'd made him _theirs._ "I…ah." He laughed around the lump in his throat. "I didn't get you guys anything."

Tooth giggled. "Well of course not. Honestly. We didn't get the almond, silly. You did."

North clapped him firmly on the shoulder, eyes sparkling. "Merry Christmas, Jack."

There was a terrible moment when Jack was sure he would have to say something. And right then he did not trust his voice at all. But Bunny hopped up like a champion. "All right, all right. Come on; let's get back. I was only halfway through my first slice of carrot cake."

"Oh, yes, fine. Big rush there," North snarked. "He is only one who eats that stuff. Right Sandy?"

Tooth raised her hand. "I'm still hungry, too."

"How can I be surprised? You eat enough for _pterodactyl."_

She pointed at herself with a falsely demure grin. "Metabolism of a humming bird."

And Jack was swept through the portal to North's where they stepped through to one of the many guest rooms. The one Jack had sort of unofficially and accidentally claimed. With its giant, four-poster bed and wood floors and big bay window complete with window seat. The portal led _here._ To _this_ room. On purpose. An open, anytime invitation. Jack could only shake his head, letting the sounds of North and Tooth bickering with an animated Sandy wash over him.

He looked over at Bunny and had to ask, "What if the almond had been in _your_ pudding? Or Sandy's or North's or Tooth's?"

Bunny gave a sweet, crooked smile and said simply, "But it _wasn't_, was it, mate."

He found he could only smile.

Later that night, after Sandy and Tooth and Bunny all left, Jack stayed behind and crept away, down through long corridors until he came to the letter room. Inside, the lights were floating as they had been.

Slowly, Jack reached inside his pocket and took out his old letter. He'd been carrying it around since that day a little over a week ago when North brought him down here to show it to him. It was a weird thing, to hold onto that letter and remember in such excruciating detail everything about who he'd been. But it had helped in a way. Because back then, it had been hard; it had been really hard at times. But even then he'd convinced himself he was happy enough. But comparing _that,_ in all it's sad, lonely detail with everything he had now...it chased away all his doubts about _Is this real? Should I trust this? Is it really okay to hope? Is it really okay to let my guard down?_ Because, yeah. The happiness he had now made what he'd _called_ happiness back then seem a lot like...misery. And he was grateful for that realization. But he didn't need to carry around who he used to be anymore. He thought...he thought he was ready to let that go.

He looked up at the lights. He didn't know if it would work or not, but he held out his letter, feeling a little silly and self-conscious. At first, nothing happened. But then, bit by bit, the paper dissolved into a sparkling stream of light and faded into the others, a lovely, frosty shade of blue. He smiled.

"You got everything you want for Christmas, little boy?" a quietly amused voice rumbled behind him.

Probably he shouldn't have been surprised. North had a way of showing up. "You know I did. And then some." He bit his lip. "Thank you." It felt so inadequate it was hard to say. But North squeezed his shoulder and seemed to understand and seemed content to leave it at that. Jack stuck his hands in his hoodie pocket as North stepped up next to him and they both stood watching the lights. "I think the almond thing was fixed," he said confidentially out the side of his mouth.

"Ah," North feigned innocence with a grin, "to be young and paranoid."

"What about you, 'Santa Claus'? Who asks you what you want for Christmas?"

"Oh, is not obvious?" He glanced at Jack. "Already I have everything I want." He nodded deeply. "But thank you for asking. And please. Family calls me North."

Jack smiled to himself and went back to watching the lights. This new year would be different than all three hundred that came before it. He couldn't think of anything better. The lights floated calmly, casting their gleaming colors on the walls and furniture. "What do you do with all of them?" he asked curiously. "You know, after Christmas but before they become Northern Lights?"

In response, North reached over and slid open a panel on the wall, revealing a massive icebox wrapped in layers of glowing, sparkling, shifting lights that left Jack wide-eyed and disbelieving. He pulled open the icebox door and reached inside to pull out two glass bottles of pop, popping the tops off and handing one to Jack. "What else?" he asked, and clinked his bottle against Jack's with a wink. "They go on fridge."

* * *

A/N: Thanks for reading! It's been so fun writing and posting this story. Again, it's based on a song by Steven Curtis Chapman called "All I Want" about an orphan writing a letter to Santa. It's an amazing song and really does an excellent job of cutting right at your heart and making you think about some of these kids in homes and foster care situations who don't have a family, not just at Christmastime, but all year. I would totally encourage you to listen to it. There's a link in my profile to a video I made with the song, and I'm sure there are several others out there on Youtube as well. Hope you're having a great day! Love!


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